Photography Genres - just cliches?

[joxby]

.......but this has gone way beyond mere over processing and become something else.

Ah but what ?
And if its not a photograph....who cares ?

Anyway, to get back to the point of the thread..

I've come round to the idea that snapz are actually what cameras are for.
Everything else is an afterthought.

Which is kinda true in that I don't think the cover of Vogue, a flies eyeball, Brighton beach at sunset or Sunday league sports stills are that important in the big scheme of things.
But they will be important to somebody as a recording of an event that means something to them, with or without HDR, fluffy water and sunsets.
We take lots of meaningless pictures, but they are not meaningless because of the genre they fit.

 

[Pookeyhead]

LOL.. dismiss something that actually is relevant, then go on to reply to your own quote. Way to go

It's relevant, because more and more people are relying on digital post processing than ever before and it is having a profound effect on what kind of images are being created.

 

[joxby]

LOL.. dismiss something that actually is relevant, then go on to reply to your own quote. Way to go

It's relevant, because more and more people are relying on digital post processing than ever before and it is having a profound effect on what kind of images are being created.

I couldn't think how else to put it.
You choose the words "over processed to something else"
I choose "not a photograph" on a photography forum.

But is that just too controversial.

 

[CaptainPenguin]

Photography is and always has been an art form and even more so today and technology has given the photographer/artist more flexibility than they have ever had to exprewss themselves.

Personally I am a traditionalist Luddite,minimal PP and I hate most HDR,replacing Skies etc etc but that's just me,many love the genres I hate and more power to them.It's a free country so just express yourself as you want to and stop moaning about the bits of your hobby that others like and you don't

 

[Steve]

I'm not sure it does actually. This to me has become something else entirely. I can't say it's the kind of work I like, but this is definitely NOT what I was referring to. Being critical I'd say it tends to have a whiff of the photoshop filter about it, but this has gone way beyond mere over processing and become something else.

No.. that's not was I was referring to.

A very diplomatic answer

 

[Pookeyhead]

A very diplomatic answer

LOL.. honestly Steve.. it wasn't.. although reading it back to myself it does look like it. I genuinely found that interesting. The PP is a bit crude, but I love the immediate effect it had on me very much. I agree with others that it's debatable whether it's a photograph or not any more, but so what.

This is the way things are going though. Convergence of media, ease of use, and ease of dissemination. Like it or not, photography is changing. It's not all good though... for every intriguing new use by people who haven't developed through the conventional channels there's probably 50 others that deserve to be deleted. In reality though, wasn't that always the case back in the film days? I think it probably was.

This thread has got me asking people about how they store their digital files though... and the prognosis isn't good. Several people I know regularly lose files, and blithely accept is as a fact of life. Weird.

Well managed, digital files should be far more secure than their analogue counterparts.. sadly, people don't seem to think back up is important.

 

[Steve]

LOL.. honestly Steve.. it wasn't.. although reading it back to myself it does look like it. I genuinely found that interesting. The PP is a bit crude, but I love the immediate effect it had on me very much. I agree with others that it's debatable whether it's a photograph or not any more, but so what.

There is a reason for the processing to achieve a certain result, and this is where I struggle with many photographs.

The picture itself does not communicate the reason, so it is just another image. If I have to explain the thinking to the viewer then the image has failed. But the viewer then understands what was trying to be achieved and this legitimises the picture.

I've spent much time over the last few months looking at University photography student's work, the majority of which would come under the 'fine art' umbrella. In almost all cases I needed an explanation of the images as either the picture failed to communicate it's intention or I was too obtuse to decipher it.

Pictures of deliberately blurred faces, scratched out details, objects out of context, backs of heads, empty chairs etc etc... When viewed without an explanation I had no idea what they were about. It required the artist to explain their thought process and the intention of the work for me to understand and then appreciate and marvel at their creativity and ingenuity. But the images alone were not able to communicate the ideas behind them.

Not sure if this fits in with the genre discussion, but if we are talking about the intention of the photographer/artist/creator then is it necessary to understand their ideas and how successful (or not) the image is in communicating this vision?

 

[Pookeyhead]

There is a reason for the processing to achieve a certain result, and this is where I struggle with many photographs.

The picture itself does not communicate the reason, so it is just another image. If I have to explain the thinking to the viewer then the image has failed. But the viewer then understands what was trying to be achieved and this legitimises the picture.

I've spent much time over the last few months looking at University photography student's work, the majority of which would come under the 'fine art' umbrella. In almost all cases I needed an explanation of the images as either the picture failed to communicate it's intention or I was too obtuse to decipher it.

Pictures of deliberately blurred faces, scratched out details, objects out of context, backs of heads, empty chairs etc etc... When viewed without an explanation I had no idea what they were about. It required the artist to explain their thought process and the intention of the work for me to understand and then appreciate and marvel at their creativity and ingenuity. But the images alone were not able to communicate the ideas behind them.

Not sure if this fits in with the genre discussion, but if we are talking about the intention of the photographer/artist/creator then is it necessary to understand their ideas and how successful (or not) the image is in communicating this vision?

I think we're possibly going off topic with this now a little, but briefly, you have to remember fine art work is really meant to be exhibited, or be printed in a book, and there will be an artist's statement to contextualise the work. Then it makes sense.

 

[TheTimeChamber]

I take pictures of whatever the hell I like, and dam the genres applied to them.

 

[vetonbike]

Please caption your images. Future historians will be eternally grateful.

Not only historians. I am in the procces of copying all my transparencies. Which start from 1955. Not all are captioned. It's giving me quite a headache trying to remember where and when I took them.

 

[NeilMc]

Seems to me that now everyone has a camera of some sort and professes to be a 'pro', the world is flooded with far too many landscapes, weddings, sunrises, sunsets, HDR, fluffy water etc etc etc.

I am starting to think more and more strongly that photography should be about documenting life in the time, part of the world and society we live in.

Thats what the 'street' photographers do now and as its very 'trendy' to call yourself a 'street' photographer and be into 'street' so there will be far more images recorded of every day life than ever were in the past.

However, the key question, and its because there are so many out there doing it, just like woolly water and all that guff, how many of these images will have the power to spark a reaction in the viewer ??

The quality is massively diluted by the sheer volumen and as the camera technology moves on getting better and better and more affordable even the most inept will be able to shoot very passable images and the gap between amatuer and professional will be closing all the time.

The Klein documentary last week showed some fantastic images, but he was capturing a very fast moving period in American history with so much going on but as has already been said on this post they werent technically great, often out of focus but its the moment they capture that makes them the great images they are. He was also there in the very early days of Vogue magazine when there were very few fashion photographers, nowadays there are thousands, the ideas were new and fresh, people hadnt seen anything like it then, but now its pretty much done to death. So I guess if you live in an evocotive period in time, the photography will reflect that.

That said he certainly wouldnt want to post them on here for C&C